In response to my explanation of why Mitch Daniels cannot be rehabilitated in the eyes of strong pro-lifers, and why he should not be considered for 2012 after commenting that “the next president would need to call a truce on social issues” (and refusing to state whether he would re-instate the Mexico City policy) I was asked here what my list of priorities would be for the next Republican President, both generally and as applied to pro-life policy.

Of course any answer is bigger than a comment, or even a single diary, and takes more than the time I have to answer it. So here is my current summary of priorities for the next Republican President. It is mostly in order of importance, with importance as defined by a mixture of what things come first sequentially, what is most pressing in terms of need, and what is most pressing morally. But a majority of the items require constant and multidirectional attention from a Chief Executive, so that sequence is a little vauge. A president never has the luxury of sole focus on only 1 agenda item. For example, you can clearly see my major pro-life priority is bolded near the bottom. It is near the bottom, because 1) it should not be first if the economy is still reeling, 2) it cannot be accomplished without the groundwork being laid. But pro-life activity would be constant which I will touch on at the end.

PRIORITIES

1.       Have a coherent conservative philosophy, goals and agenda.

2.       Genuine transparency and honest dialogue with the people from the outset.

a.       1 and 2 should include a specific method for maintaining humility and avoiding the transformation lure of the Washington Culture

3.       Fill the executive branch with competent individuals who support the philosophy, goals, and agenda, or at least understand their marching orders and are willing to carry them out.

4.       Incentivize economic growth through tax, de-regulation, and other efforts consistent with free market principles.  

5.       Reduce the size, cost, and scope of all non-military government activity.

                                                                           i.      Simplistic in terms of exceptions. For example there may be other areas where reduction is not wise, and there may be areas of military spending that need to be cut. Eg. I would personally rather see an operational missile defense system than the maintence of so many troops overseas.

                                                                         ii.      Also simplistic in terms of specific deficit reduction. I don’t feel qualified to know what goals are really attainable, but also don’t mean to be soft on the issue. I would assume a balanced budget is feasible at some point during the next presidency, but I cannot cogently argue the point one way or the other.

                                                                        iii.      Another example would be drastic cuts in education funding, but at the same time a reasonable incentive to the states for school choice for a limited amount of time as a reasonable remediation for decades of propping up the public schools.

b.      Subsection: Return responsibility to the states and the people whenever reasonably possible.

6.       De-fund, shut down, or otherwise dismantle government activity in areas not consistent with conservative principles.

7.       De-fund, shut down, or otherwise dismantle government participation in international organizations that promote policy not consistent with conservative principles.

8.       Promote conservative principles in all areas by means that do not conflict with other conservative principles.

a.       As an example, the federal government might promote abstinence only education in some ways, but it would not attempt to outlaw the teaching of contraception in contra to the State’s right to determine educational content.  

9.       Repeal health care bill in toto. If feasible, reform health care only in ways consistent with other conservative principles.

10.   Reform Energy Policy opening all reasonable resource areas for exploration and extraction, elimination of any policy, cost, treaty, trip, tax, etc. that is justified by a concern for man made global warming except to the extent necessary to properly inform the public of the truth of global warming.

11.   Seek to statutorily challenge the premise of Roe v. Wade and the legality of abortion, by making law which defines the term “person” as used in the 5^th and 14^th amendments due process clauses as including both born and unborn persons, from the moment of conception.

12.   Secure our Southern borders / root out and deport on a national level all illegal immigrants with gang affiliation and/or who have committed a crime of violence while in the United States.

13.   Reform Soc. Sec./Med. to make solvent or at least significant strides towards solvency.

So, besides the golden ring stated in # 11, pro-life activity would fit into the above in parts 1-9 by:

-          Bully Pulpit: Being fearless and able to articulate pro-life principles as a part of a governing policy.

o   The fear is the alienation of the average woman who may lean pro-choice, or who may have had an abortion, or known someone who has. The answer is that we don’t demonize these people. We don’t demonize anyone, but we do lay blame and seek to remove the influence of those who promote abortion, those who ignore the harm it causes to the women who have them, those who lie about what the unborn person experiences to convince people it are OK. We don’t avoid the issue, or cover it with a tacit half apologetic one liner to the effect that we are pro-life but certainly understand the differing views on the issue.

o   The answer is also to remove govt. obstacles to adoption where possible and other policy/communication that ameliorates the burden of carrying a baby to term while at the same time exposing the lie that having an abortion is less of a burden than having a baby.

-          Appointing pro-life individuals in all/most positions

-          Removing all federal funding not only for abortions themselves, but organizations that provide abortions, and organizations that promote abortion, and organizations that donate to organizations that do the above.

-          Remove affiliation or funding for international organizations that do the above.

-          Reverse polices on stem cell research, etc.

Of course there is tons more, but the point is there is a lot to be done on the pro-life front that can be done concurrently with fixing the economy, or the deficit. Nothing, or very little can be done if there is a legitimate “truce” on social issues. As stated in the source diary, maintaining a truce, not talking about abortion, making it seem a third rail -  is the left’s strategy. To call a truce is to surrender. Not to mention that a truce is not possible because a strategy based entirely on deception has no qualms about violating some politically expedient truce. Just like Obama had no qualms signing a meaningless oath not to fund abortion in the new health care law, while providing billions in funding for “family health services,” or whatever the line item was.

DISCLAIMER:

*Some terms in this post are militaristic in nature, words that could be used to describe actual physical battle with soldiers, but can also be used metaphorically in reference to battles that are not actual physical battles, but are merely political battles without the intent of physical harm. Except where the actual US Military is being discussed, these terms should be understood as the non-physical metaphorical type. If you have been, are now, or may become at any time in the future, a crazy person, please interpret these words as a call to engage in non-threatening letter campaign to your elected officials written on the inside cover of Hallmark Cards that feature puppies on front cover.  

Reading Aces take on the 2012 field Here; I was pleased that it seems, while still very early, a type of Redstate consensus or majority forming around Mike Pence as a unifying conservative with the major bases covered, despite some weaknesses.

But then I got into the long thread of the Mitch Daniels supporters and a reply turned into a diary. I like Mitch Daniels. He has accomplished much in Indiana. In some ways, I wish things could be different. But they can’t.

So I make this plea to the Daniel’s supporters that they do two things 1) do not ask pro-lifers to believe that Daniels is 100% pro-life, and 2) think long and hard about putting the party and the conservative movement in the position of asking pro-lifers to sacrifice for the greater good just one more time. I don’t vilify Daniels; I don’t vilify those who support Daniels, and I don’t assume that Mike Pence is the only answer merely because I think he could be one answer. It’s not about Pence or Daniels or any other candidate. It’s about what I believe pro-lifers can tolerate, and what they cannot. And it’s about the absolute necessity for the all hands on deck trend to continue into 2012.

It’s really very simple. 100% pro-lifers know that a 100% pro-lifer does not make the statement that Daniels made. To be 100% pro-life is to know the tactics of the abortion lobby. It is to understand that abortion is not legal because it was ever fairly and honestly debated. It is legal because of lies, fake statistics, emotivism,  and Orwellian twists of phrase.

But more importantly, abortion is legal because most of us simply don’t think about it. “It’s just tissue”, “I am personally pro-life but …” “Safe, legal, and rare”, “It’s such a divisive issue, let’s have a truce.” These words don’t mean “truce” they mean surrender – they are the language of the abortion lobby. They are words crafted by professional marketing firms to get you to not think about the facts on abortion.  

And most importantly, a 100% pro-lifer does not forget that a “Truce” for our side means 3000 innocent Americans are destroyed every day. Does anyone imagine a 100% pro-national defense conservative would OK a truce if 3000 troops were lost every day of the truce? Or a fiscal conservative would agree to a truce if it involved daily 1% tax increases during the period of “truce”.

Ultimately, It is much easier to believe that Romney (not that I do) has converted to being 100% pro-life than it is to believe Daniels is 100% pro-life. He is either a closeted pro-abort, or he is a squish who didn’t understand enough about being pro-life to understand the import of his statement. Either way, he has disqualified himself from my vote unless no viable option remains. And to argue the import of his statement is consistent with being 100% pro-life just makes him looks dishonest to boot. Perhaps you can argue that circumstances force a 100% fiscal conservative to still have to raise taxes occasionally. But in this arena, the act of spinning this statement just digs the hole deeper. A true conversion is the only thing that would even remotely have a chance to rehabilitate Daniels in the eyes of pro-lifers, and not in time for 2012.

Don’t assume that makes us any less conservative on issues of fiscal responsibility, small/local government, and strong national defense. It certainly does not in the case of most of the pro-lifers’ I know. Nor is it reasonable to assume we sacrifice the good for the perfect and are incapable of  biding our time, of being incremental when necessary, of not leading with the chin, of supporting the Rudi’s when in NY or the Scott Brown’s when in Mass. But it does mean we will not support a pro-abortion candidate, or someone who talks like one, in a national election unless there is no other viable option. And it is the worst of times to even come close to putting us in that position.

For a whole bunch of us, we are done buying into the squish’s abortion lite argument that only “moderates” can win in national elections, and that doing nothing is the “moderate” position when it comes to abortion.

We were the ones making the argument in 2008 that the party’s leftward slide might only be corrected by defeat and by a good dose of a socialist like Obama to re-awaken the conservative heart of our nation. Thinking hard about sitting it out, much like a stern parent might let their child spend that night in jail, even though it’s unpleasant for all involved, and even though it’s risky. We didn’t know that re-awakening would be called the tea party, but that’s what it ended up being.  

Pro-lifers’ weren’t the only ones. And pro-life wasn’t the only issue either. After all, McCain is a squish with a pretty decent pro-life record. It was not his weakest point by far. But perhaps it was easier to endure the thought of present loss for future gain for us because we have been doing it for so long, and because we knew that we were being misled. And because we knew that words like moderate, and truce, really mean surrender. We also had a lot of traitors to the movement that year. The establishment’s shameless Rudi promotion, supposed “pro-life Catholics” like Sean Humanity jumping on the bandwagon, Rick Warren hoping to trade his integrity for a seat at Obama’s table, Pat Robertson, etc.  In other words the pro-aborts were sinking their claws deep into our territory all the while we were being asked to maintain the truce.

To settle again, to appease, to buy the lie one more time - that we must accept the incremental fusion of the two party’s as a slow, steady, two man march off the left cliff, with only the justification that we must not be the first one off the cliff? It was simply too much to ask.

Many of us didn’t follow through with sitting it out, in large part because we acknowledged the gesture of Sarah Palin. In the end, most of us did what we could with a few weeks to go.  Sarah Palin reminded us that a conservative can in fact talk like a conservative without fear of not sounding like a moderate, and her part in what came next is no small thing. Barak Obama overstepped more than any of us could have imagined. He overstepped enough to bring, of all things, a CNBC moderator at the Chicago Board of Trade to boil over into a rant and call for a Boston tea party, Chicago style. It was a rant heard round the world, and the tea party was born.

Of course the tea party was and is centered on issues of freedom, fiscal responsibility, and small government. But that is not due to an absence of pro-lifers in the tea party, it is because government action under Obama was to those issues as China’s one-child policy is to pro-life policy. But that circumstantial focus on other issues cannot translate into pro-lifers declaring a truce on pro-life issues. To assume as much is absurd, and will cause problems 1000 times the size of CPAC’s rescinding of the don’t ask don’t tell policy.

Again it is very simple. WE KNOW THAT A 3000 BABIES ARE DESTROYED EVERY DAY THAT A “TRUCE” EXISTS. But it way beyond that. We sit in the aftermath of the biggest midterm election gains since WWII.  A true grassroots conservative movement has grown from zero to influencing nearly every election in the country in less than 2 years.  Majorities are once again identifying themselves as Republicans, as conservatives, and yes – as pro-life. The press has lost much of its power, and is imploding with ever more desperate and deranged attacks on conservatives, and of course Sarah Palin. Somehow mistakenly imaging her as the snakes head and hoping that if they can kill the head the snake will fall. All that is needed for further gains is for those in our party to maintain their principles, their integrity, try to do what they said they are going to do, and for God’s sake keep the heat on as true conservatives. The 3 legged kind. Not the 2 legged kind or the 1 legged kind.

So really, this is the time – right now – when we should be pressing hard – this is the time when pro-life squishes want to tell the biggest and most dedicated group of “single issue” voters, to settle for a truce on their issue?

Are you $#!@& kidding me!

Having just finshed “Ron Paul Stands With Totalitarianism” here on Redstate, my rebuttal reached diary size.

The premise of that diary was that Ron Paul is a complete and total embarrassment to the party as well as being a crazy totalitarianist becuase he was the only congressman not to vote yea on a resolution to honor Chinese dissident Liu Xiaobo for winning the Nobel Peace Prize, thereby apparently clearly the way for the allegation that:

Ron Paul has decided to make sure everyone knows that he is the only Member of Congress not opposed to brutal totalitarianism

At first, I thought, this post just seems pretty ridiculous. I admit I like Ron Paul. I also find him kooky,  an ineffective debater, disagree with him on many issues, and pray that he supports an electable candidate in 2012 versus attempting another doomed run at the White House.

But a hit piece on such a trivial issue? A hit piece because he failed to vote to congratulate a worthy winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, drawing the conclusion that he therefore supports not just totalitarianism, but brutal totalitarianism? To me the whole definition of the tinfoil hat crowd is or should be people who illogically believe something despite evidence to the contrary. Attempting to infer totalitarian support from the lack of support for a particular anti-totalitarian is about as tin hatish as it gets in my book.

At a second glance, I realized a potential reason why Ron Paul voted as he did. I have no actual idea why Ron Paul refused to vote for this particular gesture. But if I had to venture a guess, I would suggest that it had more to do with the award itself than winner of the award, and if any all the people wasting their time analyzing this haven’t addressed that possibility, then they are either stupid or intentionally avoiding the possibility to further the impact of the hit piece. If they are leaving it out for impact then they are dishonest, and yes, you can count me in for someone who ranks honesty higher on the character determination scale than kookiness.

If it isn’t obvious that the Nobel Prize has become a bastion of progressive self congratulation and propaganda with the prize going to Al Gore for promoting a wealth redistribution fraud on the grandest of all levels, or going to Barak Obama for his sheer potential to create peace, then I guess it will never become obvious. But I will suggest that this belief regarding the prize has been circulating for several decades amongst conservatives. It should also be rudimentary logic that any award recipient Congress takes the time to honor equally honors the award itself. Just because the Nobel committee might be seeking a little legitimacy after the Gore and Obama debacles of late, does not redeem nor legitimize the committee itself. I certainly would not condemn anyone who refuses to prop up the Nobel Committee. In fact, I would rather all conservatives in Congress refuse to endorse the Nobel Commitee. How about an amendment to congratulate Liu Xiaobo for what he did versus the award he won? My guess is Ron Paul wouldn’t be opposed to that.

Then on third glance, my ire got up on a slightly different tack, which is that no matter how much Ron Paul derangement syndrome one may have, it should be remembered that Ron Paul’s rise in the 2008 primaries was the pre-cursor to the tea party. We are going to have arguments, some heated and some not about those in our party. But it is snide and petty to waste time with ridiculous hit pieces on a man who has, despite his flaws, contributed greatly to where we now find ourselves. I had the very same feeling reading the recent hit piece on Sarah Palin’s Alaska found in the Weekly Standard. Why in the world are they wasting their time going after someone who has just done so much for the party and for conservatism, based on her stupid TV show?

So ultimately, I guess I am calling for a moratorium on hit pieces of helpful but controversial conservatives, especially based on trivialities. I am not saying if you cant say anything nice, dont say anything at all, but attacking Ron Paul for a vote this trivial, or discerning Sarah Palin can not win a nationwide election becuase Bristol is a bad dancer, don’t seem to get us anywhere but a 200-300 comments filled with ad-hominen attack. 

It would seem more productive towards our stated goals of conservative victories to figure out how to assimilate the Ron Paul republicans, the Sarah Palin Republicans, the Newt Gigrich Republicans, the Mike Pence Republicans, the Bobby Jindal Republicans, and all the rest into our common conservative beliefs, and then do the heavy lifting and arguinng on the ideas that we diverge on, and the truly salient skill sets of the candiates. Thinking of more creative and personally demeaning ways to call each other Ronulans and Neocons just doesn’t get us anywhere.   

Very interesting test ballons out the last few weeks looking to justify a Cable TV fairness doctrine, with a very very false premise.

We have had Jon Stewart’s rally for lefties where he purports to decry the excesses of MSNBC just as much as those of FoxNews.

We had Keith O’s highly publicized suspension for donating to Democrats, which was of course followed by news of Rupert Murdock’s significant support of Republicans, with the gyst of the story not really being that Olberman did anything wrong, but that NBC obviously has higher standards than Fox.

Then we had this from Ted Koppell.

,”The commercial success of both MSNBC and Fox News is a source of nonpartisan sadness for me. While I can appreciate the financial logic of drowning television viewers in a flood of opinions designed to confirm their own biases, the trend is not good for the republic. It is, though, the natural outcome of a growing sense of national entitlement. Daniel Patrick Moynihan’s oft-quoted observation that ‘everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not his own facts,’ seems almost quaint in an environment that flaunts opinions as though they were facts. And so, among the many benefits we have come to believe the founding fathers intended for us, the latest is news we can choose. Beginning, perhaps, from the reasonable perspective that absolute objectivity is unattainable, Fox News and MSNBC no longer even attempt it. They show us the world not as it is but as partisans (and loyal viewers) at either end of the political spectrum would like it to be. This is to journalism what Bernie Madoff was to investment: He told his customers what they wanted to hear, and by the time they learned the truth, their money was gone.”

Then this from Senator Jay Rockefeller:

 ”There’s a little bug inside of me which wants to get the FCC to say to FOX and to MSNBC: ‘Out. Off. End. Goodbye.’ It would be a big favor to political discourse; our ability to do our work here in Congress, and to the American people, to be able to talk with each other and have some faith in their government and more importantly, in their fu, in their future.”

The strategy is admirable. Liberals have realized that only attacking FoxNews while ignoring MSNBC only works on the most brain dead of liberals and loses the respect of the majority of independents. Meanwhile MSNBC has been so over the top that they are the most common victim of attacks on the liberal press. Seeming to attack both ends of the spectrum seems much more “fair and balanced” and the faulty premise is given some cover by the short memory of the American public.

The faulty premise of course is that there was every any post 1960 “good old days” of wholly objective network news. The network news has had a decidedly liberal bent for all of my days and I am 39 years old. Getting rid of Fox and MSNBC would merely return us to the status quo of all liberal news all the time. The second piece of the faulty premise is that somehow, open and obvious politically biased opinion news is abhorrent whereas the old style of hidden, manipulative, politically biased pseudo “hard” news, or lack thereof, was somehow quaint and respectable. As if covertly misreporting to progress the liberal adgenda is more honest than overtly misreporting the news to progress the liberal adgenda.

As for me, I will take an honest (not that he’s totally honest, but you know what I mean) lefty like Keith Olberman over a slimy Dan  Rather, Ted Koppel, or John Stewart any day of the week (although Stewart is probably better for pure comedic value).

I don’t know whether MSNBC is willing playing the patsy or not, but either way, lets not allow the public to believe for one minute that the likes of Stewart, Kopell, or Rockefeller are genuinly concerned about their being too much liberal opinion commentary on cable news.

So we need to hit back hard with the bias of the “mainstream” media, and of course the obvious free speech arguments and not let this balloon get off the ground any more than it already has. The problem is getting our elected officials to risk bad coverage by publically repudiating the idea that CNN, ABC, CBS, and NBC actually represent straight news organizations.

Koran’s will burn becuase of one man. B. Hussein Obama.

It has been 9 years since 9/11. One event 9 years ago that killed over 3000 Americans and did not result in Koran burning. 8 anniversarys of that day did not result in Koran burning. One mosque being built at ground zero that did not result in Koran burning. But, then, one American President defended that Mosque in right and morality and told every American whose sensitivites are affected that they are religous bigots.

That act by my President will result in Koran burning. One American President failing to show even a modicum of unity with the people he purports to lead, will result in Koran burning. I would burn one myself but I’d rather not support the Koran publishing company. Not burn one to attack that iconic religion of peace known as Islam. But as a tangible yet peaceful symbol that I have no respect for my President.

My President who sends every minon to intimidate and call one (perhaps misguided) Christian pastor names, but is silent as flags and bibles are burned, and Christian churches in Gaza are destroyed. Is silent, as the leaders of the religion of peace threaten American lives while those flags, and bibles, and churches burn without fear of reprisal.

If murderers murder American’s because Korans are burned, and Korans are burned becuase of my President, then my President must take responsibility for those deaths.

Unfortunately, my President is wrong. If murderer’s murder, it is because they are murderers. Not because of Koran’s burning. And so my President will not be to blame for the acts of murderers any more than a pastor in Florida - or any more than a wife who is beaten because she didn’t get the clothes folded on time, or a woman is raped becuase she wore a tight skirt, or a driver who is shot becuase he looked at some gang-banger the wrong way.  

But war, war is different than murder or terrorism. Countries go to war, and countries are led by men. If my President fails to appreciate that tacit approval of American’s being murdered because of a percieved insult to the religion of peace. IF HE CONTINUES TO PRETEND THAT MURDER IS AN ACCEPTABLE CONSEQUENCE TO FREEDOM - THEN MURDERERS WILL MURDER MORE AND MORE MURDER WILL LEAD TO MORE MURDER AND A TIPPING POINT WILL BE REACHED WHERE MORE MURDER WILL LEAD TO WAR. Enough will be enough at some point.

And when enough becomes enough, - those deaths, - caused by that war, - will be the full and total responsibility of my President.

The following is actual correspondence between me and a friend who was going through the Rite of Catholic Initiation for Adults (RCIA) at Xavier College in Cincinnati. Most universities (even Catholic ones) lean left, but I was pretty shocked that this RCIA group was learning “social justice” instead of the doctrines of their faith. I sent this critique to the entire RCIA group.

Following the initial email is my attempt to deconstruct the subtle heresy of this insidious movement.

From:
Sent: Friday, February 16, 2007 3:43 PM
To:
Subject: FW: RCIA

Jerry: I got this about a month ago, but I forgot to forward it on to you. It might give you some guidance of how a person of faith ought to vote his faith and conscience. (Hint: the poor, the environment, the promotion of peace, fiscal responsibility, human rights, combating corruption, and other issues will not be helped by voting Republican).

Read More →

It is sometimes fun to watch liberals unravel which I was able to do a bit yesterday reading Tom Friedman’s attempt to resuscitate global warming theory by calling it, “Global Weirding.”  

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/17/opinion/17friedman.html

While I cannot disagree with the new moniker, he and I have different reasons for our satisfaction with this label. I of course think the futile attempts to justify this movement’s existence are getting pretty weird, and he, of course wants us all to know that really “weird” weather is in fact evidence of global warming. Even, if the weird weather is cold weather. In fact, virtually all weather is proof of global warming. Pretty soon normal weather will be weird for its absence of weirdness and hence, further proof of global warming. At that time we can call the crisis simply “Global Weather.”

The irritating part of Friedman’s letter begins with his condemnation of those who would point to record snowfalls as evidence against global warming. To him these are the ignorant fools who don’t know the difference between weather and climate. Weather, I am assuming, is a daily occurrence, and climate is the longer term patterns of weather, which is presumably changing due to man made activities. An isolated record snowfall, according to Freidman, cannot possibly impact the theory of global warming one way or the other (unless of course it interpreted to prove global warming).

But being called an idiot by a liberal is not sufficient to irritate me alone. The irritating part is threefold. First, Freidman does not mention that there is actually a 15 year period without any warming, versus a one  day snowfall. (Actually, I think that mentioning the lack of warming in the last 15 years is a terminable offense at the New York Times. It falls just above plagiarism and making up stories on their disciplinary matrix.) But anyone who points to one snowfall as evidence against global warming is really pointing out the longer term trend of cold or at least “normal” weather. If we hadn’t had a snowstorm at all in the last 15 years, then pointing to one such snowfall would admittedly look silly.

The second source of angst is that when liberals chide conservatives for pointing out a cold day, they ignore the fact they have pointed to every weather phenomena from hurricanes to a mild breeze as confirmation that global warming exists. Remember when we were about to enter the age of horrific hurricane’s due to global warming after Katrina? (which was doubly idiotic as the damage from Katrina was not due to the severity of the hurricane as much as the breaking of the damn holding lake Ponchetrain in)? You may have forgotten the Katrina / global warming tie in, because it was written out of the history books when the age of horrific hurricanes did not in fact materialize.

Finally, and perhaps most irritating of all is that when liberals compare deniers who point out cold days with flat earther’s, or as Rahm Emanuel would say F..ing retards, they are doing so because we are taking a small piece of data and extrapolating a much broader theory, yet they completely ignore the fact that the entire theory of mad made global warming is based on taking an extremely small piece of data and extrapolating a much broader theory!  Watching the self-destruction is fun, but the hypocrisy still manages to boggle the mind.

Unfortunately logic is not an honored science among liberals, so simply pointing out these logical inconsistencies will usually elicit a response similar to what I might get from my 13 year old caught playing computer games when he is not supposed to be.

Me: I said no video games

Him: Oh, I thought you meant just x-box.

Me: No as we have discussed 1000 times, computer video games are in fact video games.

Him: Everybody in my class gets to play as much as they want.

Me: I don’t care, turn it off.

Him: Just let me finish this game.

Me: No.

Him: STOP FREAKING OUT ABOUT IT!

So, logic is out, but I thought it would be interesting, and perhaps more convincing to look at a few numbers that conservatives can throw out when snowbound liberals tease them about the definition of climate versus weather.

Age of Earth According to Wiki:

= 4.5 billion years

Time frame we as humans started warming the planet according to the Hockey Stick:

= 100 years (generous guestimate)

Time frame since we have seen significant warming:

= 15 years

Time frame of a snowstorm:

= 1 day

Some quick division tells us that the 100 years that refered to as the man made warming period is a time frame equal to .0000022% of the earth’s life.

The lack of warming in the last 15 years is exactly 15% of the 100 year period that warming has supposedly been caused by Humans.

The lack of warming on any given day is .0027% of the 100 year period that warming has supposedly been caused by humans.

Therefore, by comparison cold weather for one day is over 1000 times more significant to the period of warming, than the period of warming is to the age of the earth.

A period of 15 years without warming is an astounding 6,500,000 times more significant to the period of warming than the period of warming is to the age of the earth.

So the next time you comment about the freezing weather with a cute quip such as “Sure could use some global warming today!” and the token liberal in your group points out that one day of cold weather does not a trend make, you can look them straight in the eye and tell them, well it’s about 1000 times more of a trend than the theory of global warming and if you consider the last 15 years without significant warming then we have a trend that is 6.5 billion times more significant than the entire theory of global warming! - So put that in your Prius and burn it!

This newspaper article from England illuminates a sparse timeline of the final 21 minutes of two boy’s lives. This completely avoidable tragedy, contrasted with a story from my own youth, shines a bright light on the dark reality of socialism. Kieran Coupe, age 7, and Guy Davies, age 6, spent the last 21 minutes of their lives lost, terrified, and dodging traffic on a highway in Cheshire England. Cause of death? The socialistic nanny state of Great Britain.

The two boys lived in a nearby neighborhood with woods that abutted the freeway. They got lost and ended up coming out of the woods near the freeway. They decided to cross the freeway. At 7:01pm the first reports came into 999 (their version of 911) about the boys crossing the freeway. Motorists swerved and pulled over as soon as they could, they called 999. They were told by the 999 operators not to help the boys, that it was too dangerous. They went on their way. Calls came in from motorists for the next twenty minutes. No one stopped to help. The police were on the way. At 7:22 apparently unable to cross the median, the boys decided to cross back again. They didn’t make it.

Pensioner Bernard Heaton told how he saw the pair scramble onto the central reservation as he headed towards Chester in his Nissan Pathfinder. Mr Heaton said: ‘The car in front of me pulled aside to reveal a silver scooter in the road, thirty to forty feet ahead. ‘I took evasive action, braked and swerved to avoid the scooter and a young child emerging from the central reservation to retrieve it.

‘I was shocked and in my mirror caught sight of the lad’s face. I used my hands-free kit to phone 999. ‘I offered to stop but the police said said two units has been dispatched and it was too dangerous for me to try to help. ‘I wonder now if I could have made all the difference by stopping to help them.’ 

Socialism is sold peicemeal as the responsible thing to do for your neighbor; provide their health care, provide them food, provide them clothing and shelter. The reality is that socialism cannot increase responsibility because it abjucates responsibility to the government. It is a virtuous nation we are told that provides for basic rights, such as health care. The reality is that a government cannot exercise virtue on behalf of its citizens. Virtue is always and only a freely exercised individual response to a situation. Socialism forcefully sucks the virtue out of individuals and replaces it with resentment, apathy, dependence, and moral relativism.

How many cars went by the 6 and 7 year old terrified boys because they had abdicated their personal responsibility, their ability to exercise heroic virtue to the government. To them the risk of an accident on the freeway caused by stopping their own cars was a  morally equivilent counterbalance to their responsibility to help the boys. The government confirmed their belief.

The government wasn’t quite able to get their on time.

PC Jordan said: ‘I raced to the scene at 120mph and arrived just seconds after the collision. ’I saw two bodies. One on the central lane and one on the hard shoulder. It was immediately clear that the boy in lane two was dead. ‘I headed to the other boy and turned him over but it was obvious from his horrendous injuries that he was also dead.

A number of motorists were out of their cars and screaming hysterically.

It was much too dangerous to stop their cars to help these boys, but apparently the motorists were able to safely get out of their cars and scream hysterically after the pair had been run down.

The contrasting story from my youth is the act of a friend of my dad’s named John. John was pulling out onto a two-lane highway behind a tractor driven by a boy of 14 or 15. As the boy pulled out, John watched in horror as a driver in the opposite lane pulled out to pass at the same time. Without hesitation John floored his truck into the oncoming car and likely saved the boys life. He quickly weighed the near certain death of the boy on the fully exposed tractor, against his and the other driver’s chances of injury from a side impact collision. The boy lived. John and the other driver had minor injuries.

For their not to be at least one “John” in the crowd of dozens or hundreds of drivers that passed by those boys during those 21 minutes when they could have been saved, indicates a corrupt group mentality. I say that this corrupt mentaility was caused by England’s socialism, big government, nanny state, whatever name you want to give it.  

Fighting the tide of socialism is to fight a false premise and a false promise. We can no longer just state plainly that this is socialistic and expect a majority to understand why that is bad. In our schools, our media, even some of our churches, the rosy picture is painted by snake oil salesmen and their prodigy.

Perhaps it helps to tell the naïve what we may become in a socialist world. We become the antithesis of the good neighbor we thought we were becoming. We become all of those drivers who watched Kerian and Guy in their rear view mirrors while calling 999, assured they had fulfilled their responsibility.

God bless their souls.